UFC 290 - Alexander the Greatest?

After his fifth title defence at UFC 290, can we now say that Alexander Volkanovski is the greatest featherweight of all time?

At the top of what was a frontrunner for the best card of the year, Alexander Volkanovski once again showed that he is without doubt the best featherweight on the planet, and I would also argue that he should still be the number 1 on the pound for pound list. Yair Rodriguez is a tricky puzzle to solve because of his range of attacks and unpredictability. When he won the interim belt against Josh Emmett he showed more sides to his game when he finished the fight by triangle choke after piecing up Emmett on the feet beforehand. Volkanovski himself was very complimentary to Rodriguez in the lead-up to the fight and acknowledged how dangerous he was, but in the end Rodriguez just had nothing for the champion. Volkanovski was good enough to hang on the feet, but when implementing his superior grappling it was clear that he was far ahead of his opponent. With someone like Yair Rodriguez there’s always the chance of being caught, but in the end it was Volk that caught him with a brilliant counter right hook before taking him down and smothering him with ground and pound.

So now it begs the question, what’s next for Volkanovski? The next contender at featherweight should be Ilia Topuria, who was in attendance on Saturday night. But another crack at the 155lbs belt must also be tempting based on how close the the last bout with Islam Makhachev was, but that might be to soon for Volkanovski. He said that he had to get his hand checked out and UFC 294 is only 3 months away, so it all depends on the severity of that injury. I would love to see a rematch between Volkanovski and Makhachev, but Volkanovski vs Topuria is also a very intriguing matchup, so I’ll be relatively happy no matter what happens next.

Now, let’s talk legacy. Is there a genuine argument for Volkanovski as the greatest featherweight of all time? I don’t want to jump the gun like a lot of people do when it comes to GOAT conversations (cough Joe Rogan cough), but Volkanovski is so dominant, so skilful and is starting to build up a quite incredible resumé. Even before winning the title he beat both Chad Mendes and José Aldo, before ending Max Holloway’s 14 fight win streak at featherweight to win the title. He then beat Holloway in the rematch in a very close and somewhat controversial fight, before disposing of both Brian Ortega and The Korean Zombie quite easily (Well, minus the two close-call submission attempts in the Ortega fight). By then Holloway had earned his way back to a title shot, and the trilogy was on. Volkanovski left no doubt this time though. He wasn’t able to finish Holloway (but let’s be honest, who can?), but it was a dominant 50-45 decision, where he clearly won every round. After this weekends win against the interim champion Yair Rodriguez, I don’t think it’s preposterous to say that he’s the best ever at 145lbs. On the official UFC weigh-in show DC was tasked to make a list with his top 3 featherweight, where he put Max Holloway, José Aldo and Alexander Volkanovski in that order. At this moment in time, I don’t think Max is in the conversation, and it’s between Aldo and Volk. I won’t argue with anyone who has the king of Rio and newly inducted UFC Hall of Famer at number 1, I personally think Volk moved just ahead after what he did this weekend.